Poyet enjoyed an enviable 100 per cent record against Newcastle as Sunderland manager.

Advocaat would give the Black Cats’ whiskers to mark his home debut with more of the same.

Just do not expect him to paint any pretty pictures where paintballing is the more expedient option.

(Image: Getty)

Advocaat said: “The only important thing in the final eight games is winning – the way we do that isn’t important.

“If we win games very ugly, I like that. How do we win ugly? Play very negative if the need is there.

“But in derby games, playing at home gives you a big advantage. So if we can do what we did against West Ham – tactically we did well, although we didn’t create a lot of chances – with our fans behind us, we can do even better. I don’t agree the derby is one of the biggest games in our history.

“For us, every game is ­important and we need the points. Newcastle is only the most ­important game because it’s the next one.

“But I have seen the intensity of the game here – if you’re involved eight or 10 times in Rangers against Celtic, you know about it.”

Week to forget: Wes Brown limps off against the Hammers (Image: Getty)

Advocaat will honour Poyet’s promise of two days off for players not called up for international duty this week before settling on the personnel and pattern required for the ear-splitting din of the derby.

Centre-back Wes Brown limped off injured after just 11 minutes at Upton Park – his second bad result in a week after his clan lost 548-0 on ITV’s All Star Family Fortunes.

We asked 100 people if ­Sunderland will stay up if they are mugged at home by the Mags. Our survey said: “Uh-oh.”

Hammers midfielder Stewart Downing conceded the East Enders were fortunate when substitute Nene flattened Seb Larsson in the build-up to Sakho’s winner.

He admitted: “We got a bit of luck but we were due a little bit. You can’t play brilliant every week and hopefully that will kick us on to another winning streak.